Claude Debussy

22 aug 1862 (St. Germain-en-Laye) - 25 mar 1918 (Paris)

Books about Claude Debussy and his music

Lederer VictorDebussy: The Quiet Revolutionary (Unlocking the Masters Series No. 13)Amadeus Press, 2007-03-01; ISBN 1574671537; 148 pagesVictor Lederer explores the sophistication, refinement and inspirations of Debussy's music, pointing out subtleties that otherwise could take years of careful listening to fully appreciate. Includes a full-length CD of the maestro's masterworks. Price indication: $ 12.99

Elie Robert, SchmitzThe Piano Works of Claude DebussyDover Publications, 1966; ISBN 0486215679; 234 pagesPart biography, part criticism and part analysis, this fascinating study of one of music’s greatest geniuses is above all an authoritative commentary on the entire corpus of Debussy’s work for solo piano. Written with special insights for the performer. Price indication: $ 9.95

Claude DebussyPrelude to "the Afternoon of a Faun": An Authoritative Score Mallarme's Poem, Backgrounds and Scores, Criticism and Analysis (Critical Scores)W. W. Norton & Company, 1970; ISBN 0393099393; 176 pagesThis is a study score plus a comprehensive body of tools for the study of the work.
The book features:
A score embodying the best available musical text
Historical background
A detailed analysis of the music
Other significant analytic essays & critical comments
Selective bibliography
Music examples & charts illustrate the analyses and each essay is fully annotated by the editor. Price indication: $ 18.85

Paul RobertsImages : The Piano Music of Claude DebussyAmadeus Press, 2003; ISBN 1574670689; 372 pagesParis at the turn of the 20th century was obsessed with the interrelations of the arts. It was a time when artists and writers spoke of poetry as music, sounds as colors, and paintings as symphonies. The music of Claude Debussy, with its unique textures and dazzling colors, was the perfect counterpart to the bold new styles of painting in France. Paul Roberts probes the sources of Debussy's artistic inspiration, relating the "impressionist" titles to the artistic and literary ferment of the time. He also draws on his own performing experience to touch on all the principal technical problems for a performer of Debussy's piano music. His many suggestions about interpreting the music will be particularly valuable to performers as well as listeners. Price indication: $ 16.97

Roy HowatDebussy in Proportion : A Musical AnalysisCambridge University Press, 1986; ISBN 0521311454; 256 pagesThis is the first paperback edition of Roy Howat's stimulating and provocative study of Debussy's unorthodox use of musical form. Throught detailed analyses of the piano pieces Reflets dans l'eau and L'isle joyeuse and the symphonic poem La mer, Dr Howat shows how the pieces are built precisely and intricately around the two ratios of Golden Section and bisection so that the music is organised in various geometrical patterns which contribute substantially to its expansive and dramatic impact. The final chapter traces evidence of whether the proportional systems were designed consciously, and if so, where and why Debussy might have learnt such techniques. The evidence includes his involvement in the Symbolist movement and in esotericism. Price indication: $ 31.99

Simon Trezise and Jonathan CrossThe Cambridge Companion to Debussy (Cambridge Companions to Music)Cambridge University Press, 2003; ISBN 0521654785; 348 pagesOften considered the father of twentieth-century music, Debussy was a visionary whose influence is still felt. This Companion offers new insights into Debussy's character, his environment and his music, including challenging views of the roles of nature and eroticism in his life and music. While works in all genres are discussed, they are considered through the themes of sonority, rhythm, tonality and form, with closing chapters considering the performance and reception of his music in the first years of the new century. Price indication: $ 29.99

Jane FulcherDebussy and His World (The Bard Music Festival)Princeton University Press, 2001; ISBN 0691090424; 350 pagesClaude Debussy's Paris was factionalized, politicized, and litigious. It was against this background of ferment and change--which characterized French society and music from the Franco-Prussian War to World War I--that Debussy re-thought music. This book captures the complexity of the composer's restless personal and artistic identity within the new picture emerging of the musical, social, and political world of fin-de-siècle Paris. Debussy's setting did not simply mold his style. Rather, it challenged him to define a style and then to revamp it again and again as he situated himself simultaneously via the present and the past. These essays trace Debussy's perpetual reinvention, both social and creative, from his earliest to his last works. They explore tensions and contradictions in his best-known compositions and examine lesser-known pieces that reveal new aspects of Debussy's creative appropriation from poetry, painting, and non-Western music. The contributors reveal the extent to which Debussy's personal and professional lives were intertwined and sometimes in conflict. Belonging to no one group or class, but crossing many, Debussy abjured the orthodox. A maverick who reviled all convention and searched for a music that authentically reflected experience, Debussy balked at entering any situation--salons, musical societies, or factions--that would categorize and thus distort him. Because of this, music lovers still argue over the degree to which Debussy's music is Impressionist, symbolist, or even French. Aptly, the volume's editor reads Debussy's last works as a dialogue with himself that reflects his inherently pluralistic, paradoxical, negotiated, and ever-changing identity. William Austin's description of Debussy as ''one of the most original and adventurous musicians who ever lived'' is often repeated. This book illustrates how right Austin was and shows why Debussy's unclassifiable art continues to fascinate and perplex his historians even as it enthralls new listeners. The contributors are Leon Botstein, Christophe Charle, John Clevenger, Jane F. Fulcher, David Grayson, Brian Hart, Gail Hilson-Woldu, and Marie Rolf. Price indication: $ 17.79

Roger NicholsThe Life of Debussy (Musical Lives)Cambridge University Press, 1998-04-28; ISBN 0521578876; 196 pagesThe early music of Claude Debussy was influenced by the work of Wagner, for whom he had great admiration. However, soon Debussy's music became more experimental and individualistic, as is clear in his first mature work Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. Debussy quickly moved away from traditional techniques and produced the pictures in sound that led his work to be described as "musical Impressionism." This new biography--the first in English in 30 years--offers new insights into the life of this enigmatic composer, revealing a figure more seminal and revolutionary than previously thought. Price indication: $ 34.96

Samuel Hsu and Sidney Grolnic and Mark Peters'Claude Debussy As I Knew Him' and Other Writings by Arthur Hartmann (Eastman Studies in Music)University of Rochester Press, 2004; ISBN 1580461042; 361 pagesArthur Hartmann (1881-1956), a celebrated violinist who performed over a thousand recitals throughout Europe and the United States, met Claude Debussy in 1908, after he had transcribed 'Il pleure dans mon coeur' for violin and piano. Their relationship developed into friendship, and in February 1914 Debussy accompanied Hartmann in a performance of three of Hartmann's transcriptions of Debussy's works. The two friends saw each other for the last time on the composer's birthday, 22 August 1914, shortly before Hartmann and his family fled Europe to escape the Great War. With the publication of Hartmann's memoir Claude Debussy as I Knew Him, along with the twenty-two known letters from Claude Debussy and the thirty-nine letters from Emma Debussy to Hartmann and his wife, the richness and importance of their relationship can be appreciated for the first time. The memoir covers the years 1908-1918. Debussy's letters to Hartmann span the years 1908-1916, and Emma (Mme) Debussy's letters span the years 1910-1932. Also included are the facsimile of Debussy's Minstrels manuscript transcription for violin and piano, three previously unpublished letters from Debussy to Pierre Louÿs, and and correspondece between Hartmann and Béla Bartók, Nina Grieg, Alexandre Guilmant, Charles Martin Loeffler, Marian MacDowell, Hans Richter, and Anton Webern, along with Hartmann's memoirs on Loeffler, Ysaÿe, Joachim and Grieg. Samuel Hsu is a pianist and professor of music at Philadelphia Biblical University. He completed his Ph.D. in historical musicology at the University of California at Santa Barbara in 1972 with a dissertation on Debussy. Sidney Grolnic has been a librarian in the Music Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia for over twenty years and serves as curator of the library's Hartmann Collection. Mark A. Peters is a Ph.D. candidate in historical musicology at the University of Pittsburgh and is currently completing his dissertation on J. S. Bach's sacred cantatas to texts by Mariana von Zi Price indication: $ 85.00

Claude DebussyPoetic Debussy: A Collection of His Song Texts and Selected LettersNortheastern Univ Pr, 1982; ISBN 0930350286; 318 pagesThis completely revised second edition of The Poetic Debussy contains the most recent discoveries in the composer's oeuvre, including a number of hitherto unknown songs. The texts of all Debussy's songs, both in the original French and with revised English translations on the facing page, are collected in chronological order, with notes and location of sources. In addition, Margaret Cobb has brought together a fascinating selection of Debussy's letters which have poetic refences, and has updated the notes on those twenty-six compositions based on or inspired by literary texts. This work will prove an invaluable aid to performers, scholars and students, as it contains the texts, with translations, of the full output of Debussy's songs, describes his works derived from literary sources, and includes important background material. Price indication: $ 19.67

Leon VallasClaude Debussy: His Life and WorksDover Pubns, 1973; ISBN 0486229165; 366 pagesText extracted from opening pages of book: CLAtJDE DEBUSSY HIS LIFE AND WORKS Translated from the French by MAIRE and GRACE O BRIEN OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS London : Humphrey Milford 1933 L ; ; PREFACE - * * & amp; lt; w & quot; * IN this book on Claude & quot; Debussy I have avoided all biographical details the publication of which, fefight be deemed premature and indiscreet. The secrets of his private life belong to those who shared it and who bear his name. For the purposes of this book I have made use only of such documents as were originally intended for publication or which have by chance become public property. To my mind, the really interesting points in the life of a musician are his works, his activities, and his influence on his contemporaries. The book which I published in 1928 under the title of The Theories of Claude Debussy, musicien franfais, supplements the present work, revealing as it does the composer s ideas on music given to the public between the years 1901 and 1916. I have made frequent use of Debussy s published correspon dence : his letters to Vasnier and Ernest Chausson ( Revue Musicale, December 1925 and May 1926) and to the publisher, Durand ( Paris, Durand, 1927). I have also drawn on the reminiscences published by the Revue Musicale, in May 1926 ( articles by: Raymond Bonheur, Paul Dukas, Robert Godet, Andre Messager, Gabriel Pierne, Henri de Regnier, Marguerite Vasnier, Paul Vidal). I have likewise utilized the recollections to which Maurice Emmanuel refers in his study on Telleas et Melisande ( Paris, Mellotte, 1926). CONTENTS I. CHILDHOOD. THE CONSERVATOIRE ( 1862-83) . i II. THE PRIX DE ROME ( 1883-4) 22 III. THE VILLA MEDICI ( 1885-7); THE ENVOIS DE ROME ( 1885-90) 32 IV. RETURN TO PARIS ( 1887). INFLUENCES . . 49 V. THE FIRST COMPOSITIONS ( 1888-93) . . 66 VI. BEFORE PELLfiAS : THE QUARTET AND THE PROSES LYRIQUES ( 1892-9) . . .80 VII. & amp; lt; L APRfiS-MIDI D UN FAUNE ; THE NOCTURNES ; CRITIQUES ( 1894-1901) . . . .101 VIII. PELLfiAS ET MfiLISANDE ( 1892-1902) DEBUS SYISM 121 IX. CHAMBER MUSIC. C LA MER ( 1902-7) . . 152 X. VARIOUS COMPOSITIONS. LE CAS DEBUSSY ( 1907-10) ...... 181 XL IMAGES FOR ORCHESTRA; PRELUDES AND SONGS ( 1910-13) . . . . - 195 XII. DRAMATIC MUSIC, VARIOUS PLANS. LE MAR TYRE DE SAINT-SfiBASTIEN ( 1911) . . 217 XIII. JEUX. LA BOlTE A JOUJOUX ( 1913) . . 235 XIV. THE WAR. LAST YEARS ( 1914-18) . . .251 APPENDIX A ....... 274 B 274 C . . . - . . - 275 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Achille-Claude Debussy ( in 1867) . . . facing p. 2 Achille-Claude Debussy, while at the Conservatoire ( about 1874) ........ 10 New Year s Greetings to Madame Vasnier ( on the music of Mandoline) . . . . ,, 18 Music Facsimile ( from Le Gladiateur) . between pp. 24 and 25 Villa Medici ( 1885) ..... facing p. 32 Debussy at the house of Ernest Chausson, 1893 . . ,, 62 A few pages from the note-book of Maurice Emmanuel .... between pp. 84 and 85 Claude Debussy ( about 1895) .... facing p. 90 Claude Debussy ( about 1895) . . . - ,, 101 Letter to Pierre Louys . . . . ,, no Debussy at the house of Pierre Louys ( about 1895) . 112 Debussy at the piano ( about 1898) . . ,, 116 Claude Debussy ( about 1900) . . . ,, 121 Debussy and his first wife, Rosalie Texier ( about 1902) . ,, 124 At the time of Telleas et Melisande 138 Debussy, photographed by Pierre Louys ( about 1900) * ,, 15 Debussy, by Jacques-fimile Blanche ( 1903) - * 54 Letter to Jacques Durand ( August 1903) . . - ,, * 57 Debussy and his first wife, Rosalie Texier, at Bichain ( about 1902) ..... 158 Debussy at Pourville ( September 1904) . . - ,, 168 Debussy outside his home ( about 1910). . 212 Letter to Andr6 Halle& quot; ( 27 August 1913) - 240 One of the 363 themes in Roman de Tristan* Debussy s note for the Fourth of a projected Series of Six ^ Sonatas ..... Opening of the Finale of the Violin Sonata CHAPTER I CHILDHOOD. THE CONSERVATOIRE ( 1862-83) IN the heart of the tle-de-France, at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, tjte, birthplace of Louis XIV, was Price indication: $ 101.08